Social Mobility

Gary Solon

Raj Chetty

Florencia Torche

Leaders: Raj Chetty, Gary Solon, Florencia Torche

The purpose of the Social Mobility RG is to develop and exploit new administrative sources for measuring mobility and the effects of policy on mobility out of poverty. This research group is doing so by (a) providing comprehensive analyses of intergenerational mobility based on linked administrative data from U.S. tax returns, W-2s, and other sources, and (b) developing a new infrastructure for monitoring social mobility, dubbed the American Opportunity Study, that is based on linking census and other administrative data. Here’s a sampling of projects:

Small place estimates: The Equal Opportunity Project, led by Raj Chetty, uses tax return data to monitor opportunities for mobility out of poverty. In one of the new lines of analysis coming out of this project, the first round of results at the level of “commuting zones” are being redone at a more detailed level (e.g., census block level), thus allowing for even better inferences about the effects of place.

The American Opportunity Study: This research group is also collaborating with the Census Bureau to develop a new infrastructure for monitoring mobility that treats linked decennial census data as the spine on which other administrative data are hung.

Colleges and rising income inequality: Where do poor children go to attend college? The “Mobility Report Card” will convey the joint distribution of parent and student incomes for every Title IV institution in the United States.

The “absolute mobility” of the poor: What fraction of poor children grow up to earn more than their parents? Have rates of absolute upward mobility changed over time? This project develops a new method of estimating rates of absolute mobility for the 1940-1984 birth cohorts.

Intergenerational elasticities in the U.S.: There remains some debate about the size of intergenerational elasticities in the U.S. A rarely-used sample of 1987 tax data provides new evidence on U.S. elasticities.

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Mobility - CPI Research

State of the Union 2016: Economic Mobility

When compared to 24 middle-income and high-income countries, the U.S. ranks 16th in the amount of intergenerational earnings mobility. The relatively low level of mobility in the U.S. may arise in part because low-income children in the U.S. tend to have less stable and lower-income families, less secure families, and parents who have less time to devote to their children.

Living in a High Inequality Regime

Income inequality in the United States is the highest it has been since the roaring 20s. The rich are getting richer. The middle class is descending from the middle. The poor are getting poorer. What accounts for the increase in wealth at the top? What dynamic forces have shaped this spectacular disparity? How are Americans adjusting to life in this brave new world? What effect does the social fallout of this inequality regime have on the fabric of American society?

The effects of rising inequality have proven difficult to tease out, but as the United States enters a moment in history in which key policy decisions about inequality, mobility, and poverty are being made, it is important for researchers to examine this trend to learn why there is so much inequality in the United States. In this volume of The ANNALS experts examine the “social fallout” from this income imbalance. They shine a light on the winners and losers, focusing on occupational inequality, racial and gender inequality, as well as inequality in veteran groups. They explore accessibility and segregation to gauge how educational and crime/punishment trends are shaped by inequality. Finally, they examine how inequality impacts Americans’ views of themselves and others; the dynamics of class and culture; and the effects of socioeconomics on marriage, health, and death.

Educational Homogamy in Two Gilded Ages: Evidence from Intergenerational Social Mobility Data.

Patterns of intermarriage between persons who have varying levels of educational attainment are indicators of socioeconomic closure and affect the family backgrounds of children. This article documents trends in educational assortative mating throughout the twentieth century in the United States, using socioeconomic data on adults observed in several large cross section surveys collected between 1972 and 2010 and on their parents who married a generation earlier. Spousal resemblance on educational attainment was very high in the early twentieth century, declined to an all-time low for young couples in the early 1950s, and has increased steadily since then. These trends broadly parallel the compression and expansion of socioeconomic inequality in the United States over the twentieth century. Additionally, educationally similar parents are more likely to have offspring who themselves marry within their own educational level. If homogamy in the parent generation leads to homogamy in the offspring generation, this may reinforce the secular trend toward increased homogamy.

Intergenerational Mobility and Gender in Mexico

This article studies intergenerational socioeconomic mobility in Mexico comparing men and women. In contrast to most sociological work that uses individual-level measures to proxy family socioeconomic status, we use a direct measure of family living standards for both generations, based on an index of economic well-being. Strong intergenerational persistence is found in Mexico compared to other countries. Persistence is stronger for men than women, particularly among advantaged families. The role of education in the mobility process is examined. Findings indicate that “excess immobility” of men is not mediated by education. Wider gender differences among married/cohabiting than single respondents suggests parents are more likely to transfer socioeconomic resources to their married sons than married daughters. We argue for the advantages of measuring socioeconomic status directly at the household level, and of evaluating gender differences to gain insight about mobility mechanisms.

Intergenerational Mobility and Equality of Opportunity

Intergenerational mobility—the association between parents’ and adult children’s economic wellbeing—is an important sociological concept because it provides information about inequality of opportunity in society, and it has gained relevance in the recent past due to the increase economic inequality in most of the affluent world. This article provides an overview of the different measures of mobility used by sociologists and economists, as well as main empirical findings about mobility. I then move to topics that push mobility analysis beyond its bivariate focus: The association between intergenerational mobility and economic inequality, the mechanisms for mobility, and the validity of mobility as a measure of inequality of opportunity. I suggest that the association between mobility and inequality is likely spurious, driven by varying institutional arrangements across countries, and that mobility analysis is most useful when focused on describing the bivariate intergenerational association across countries and over time.